A man in a gleaming white suit comes to a small Southern town on the eve of integration. His name is Adam Cramer. He calls himself a social reformer. But his true aim is to incite the people against letting Black children into the town's White school. Soon he has the White citizens of the town all worked up. He thinks he is leading them but a man that he befriends, and then immediately betrays, knows better. The people have become a mob. The Black leader of a church and a White newspaper editor soon feel its wrath. But after a false accusation against a Black student, Adam Cramer may find that the people are both totally, and permanently, out of his control.